Single mimivirus particles intercepted and imaged with an X-ray laser
Open accessAbstract
X-ray lasers offer new capabilities in understanding the structure of biological systems, complex materials and matter under extreme conditions. Very short and extremely bright, coherent X-ray pulses can be used to outrun key damage processes and obtain a single diffraction pattern from a large macromolecule, a virus or a cell before the sample explodes and turns into plasma. The continuous diffraction pattern of non-crystalline objects permits oversampling and direct phase retrieval. Here we show that high-quality diffraction data can be obtained with a single X-ray pulse from a non-crystalline biological sample, a single mimivirus particle, which was injected into the pulsed beam of a hard-X-ray free-electron laser, the Linac Coherent Light Source. Calculations indicate that the energy deposited into the virus by the pulse heated the particle to over 100,000 K after the pulse had left the sample. The reconstructed exit wavefront (image) yielded 32-nm full-period resolution in a single exposure and showed no measurable damage. The reconstruction indicates inhomogeneous arrangement of dense material inside the virion. We expect that significantly higher resolutions will be achieved in such experiments with shorter and brighter photon pulses focused to a smaller area. The resolution in such experiments can be further extended for samples available in multiple identical copies.
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The first proof-of-principle experiments for single-shot imaging of single nanometer-sized samples in the gas phase targeted cluster shapes and sizes, morphologies of cluster assemblies, and imaging biological specimens.
“The first proof-of-principle experiments for single-shot imaging of single nanometer-sized samples in the gas phase (figure 15) were targeted at determining cluster shapes and sizes [92], the morphologies of cluster assemblies [93], and imaging biological specimens [94].”
From Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics (2018) · cites this paper as [94]
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- Authors
- Seibert, M. M., Ekeberg, T., Maia, F. R. N. C., Svenda, M., Andreasson, J., Jönsson, O., Odić, D., Iwan, B., Rocker, A., Westphal, D., Hantke, M., DePonte, D. P., Barty, A., Schulz, J., Gumprecht, L., Coppola, N., Aquila, A., Liang, M., White, T. A., Martin, A., Caleman, C., Stern, S., Abergel, C., Seltzer, V., Claverie, J.-M., Bostedt, C., Bozek, J. D., Boutet, S., Miahnahri, A. A., Messerschmidt, M., Krzywinski, J., Williams, G., Hodgson, K. O., Bogan, M. J., Hampton, C. Y., Sierra, R. G., Starodub, D., Andersson, I., Bajt, S., Barthelmess, M., Spence, J. C. H., Fromme, P., Weierstall, U., Kirian, R., Hunter, M., Doak, R. B., Marchesini, S., Hau-Riege, S. P., Frank, M., Shoeman, R. L., Lomb, L., Epp, S. W., Hartmann, R., Rolles, D., Rudenko, A., Schmidt, C., Foucar, L., Kimmel, N., Holl, P., Rudek, B., Erk, B., Hömke, A., Reich, C., Pietschner, D., Weidenspointner, G., Strüder, L., Hauser, G., Gorke, H., Ullrich, J., Schlichting, I., Herrmann, S., Schaller, G., Schopper, F., Soltau, H., Kühnel, K.-U., Andritschke, R., Schröter, C.-D., Krasniqi, F., Bott, M., Schorb, S., Rupp, D., Adolph, M., Gorkhover, T., Hirsemann, H., Potdevin, G., Graafsma, H., Nilsson, B., Chapman, H. N., & Hajdu, J.
- Affiliations
- Uppsala University (SE)
- Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY (DE)
- Universität Hamburg (DE)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (US)
- Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SE)
- Arizona State University (US)
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (US)
- Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (US)
- Max Planck Institute for Medical Research (DE)
- Center for Free-Electron Laser Science (DE)
- PNSensor (Germany) (DE)
- Max Planck Society (DE)
- Forschungszentrum Jülich (DE)
- Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (DE)
- Technische Universität Berlin (DE)
- Corresponding author
- Abergel, Chantal
- ORCID
- Seibert, M. Marvin
- Ekeberg, Tomas
- Maia, Filipe R. N. C.
- Svenda, Martin
- Andreasson, Jakob
- Iwan, Bianca
- Rocker, Andrea
- Westphal, Daniel
- Hantke, Max
- DePonte, Daniel P.
- Barty, Anton
- Schulz, Joachim
- Gumprecht, Lars
- Aquila, Andrew
- Liang, Mengning
- White, Thomas A.
- Martin, Andrew
- Caleman, Carl
- Stern, Stephan
- Abergel, Chantal
- Claverie, Jean-Michel
- Bostedt, Christoph
- Bozek, John D.
- Boutet, Sébastien
- Messerschmidt, Marc
- Williams, Garth
- Hodgson, Keith O.
- Bogan, Michael J.
- Hampton, Christina Y.
- Sierra, Raymond G.
- Andersson, Inger
- Bajt, Saša
- Barthelmess, Miriam
- Spence, John C. H.
- Fromme, Petra
- Weierstall, Uwe
- Kirian, Richard
- Hunter, Mark
- Marchesini, Stefano
- Frank, Matthias
- Shoeman, Robert L.
- Epp, Sascha W.
- Hartmann, Robert
- Rolles, Daniel
- Rudenko, Artem
- Holl, Peter
- Rudek, Benedikt
- Erk, Benjamin
- Reich, Christian
- Gorke, Hubert
- Ullrich, Joachim
- Schlichting, Ilme
- Schopper, Florian
- Krasniqi, Faton
- Rupp, Daniela
- Gorkhover, Tais
- Graafsma, Heinz
- Chapman, Henry N.
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2011-02
- Volume
- 470
- Issue
- 7332
- Pages
- 78-81
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- PMC
- PMC4038304
- OpenAlex
- W2144054043
- Cited by
- 904
- References
- 35
- Citations by year
- 2026: 14 · 2025: 25 · 2024: 41 · 2023: 31 · 2022: 35 · 2021: 33 · 2020: 60 · 2019: 58 · 2018: 67 · 2017: 57 · 2016: 75 · 2015: 87 · 2014: 94 · 2013: 81 · 2012: 89
- FWCI
- 111.04
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- RMIT Research Repository (RMIT University Library) (submittedVersion)
- Desy Publications Database (Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (submittedVersion)
- Max Planck Digital Library (submittedVersion)
- Figshare (submittedVersion)
- MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion)
- European XFEL (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (0919195, 1021557)
- U.S. Department of Energy
- Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
- Agence Nationale de la Recherche
- Swedish Foundation for International Cooperation in Research and Higher Education
- Stiftelsen Olle Engkvist Byggmästare
- Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
- National Institute of General Medical Sciences (R01GM095583)
- Basic Energy Sciences
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Radiation › Advanced X-ray Imaging Techniques
- Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Materials Chemistry › Enzyme Structure and Function
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Structural Biology › Advanced Electron Microscopy Techniques and Applications
- Keywords
- Mimivirus, single-particle imaging, X-ray free-electron laser, Linac Coherent Light Source, radiation damage, phase retrieval, virus structure, photosystem I, nanocrystals, ultrafast X-ray pulses, sample heating
- MeSH terms
- Electrons, Hot Temperature, Lasers, Time Factors, X-Ray Diffraction, X-Rays, Photons, Mimiviridae
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